Home Page Of Pebble, what a user sees when they login in, quick view of all tasks.
Landing Page Of Pebble, learn our mission and login into pebble!
Task Page Of Pebble, place to view all the tasks of your group, assign tasks, view, delete, and edit!

🪨 Pebble

Open-source team collaboration for student organizations on a budget

Pebble Dashboard

🎯 Mission

Pebble was born out of necessity at FIU SEDS (Students for the Exploration and Development of Space) when we realized that existing team collaboration tools were simply too expensive for student organizations with limited budgets. Instead of compromising on functionality, we decided to build our own open-source solution that any student organization can use, modify, and contribute to.

⚠️ Hackathon Disclaimer

This project is currently in active development for a hackathon. Do not run production deployments yet as the application is not ready for full-scale use. We're building this iteratively and welcome contributions from the community!

✨ Why Pebble?

100% Free & Open Source - No subscription fees, no per-user costs
Built by Students, for Students - We understand the unique challenges of student organizations
Simple & Focused - Task management without the bloat of enterprise tools
Real-time Collaboration - See changes instantly across all team members
Self-Hostable - Own your data and control your costs
Hackathon Ready - Built with rapid development and iteration in mind

🚀 Features

Authentication: Secure login with Auth0
Task management: Assign tasks with metadata (due date, assigned date, status, priority)
Team organization: Structured member views with admin privileges for oversight
Dashboard insights: Real-time stats on invoices, customers, tasks, and progress
UI clarity: A professional dashboard showing collected vs. pending values, revenue trends, invoices, and quick navigation through a sidebar
Real-time task collaboration: See updates instantly across all team members
User attribution: Track who created and completed each task
Responsive design: Works seamlessly on desktop and mobile
Zero setup complexity: Just enter your name and start collaborating

🛠 Tech Stack

Frontend: Next.js (App Router), React, Tailwind CSS, TypeScript, JavaScript
Authentication: Auth0 with @auth0/nextjs-auth0
Backend/API: Next.js API routes for tasks, invoices, and customer data
Database: Prisma ORM with PostgreSQL
Real-time: WebSocket connections for live updates
Dev tools: GitHub for version control, VS Code as IDE, npm/pnpm for packages
Hosting: Vercel
Deployment: Configured .env variables for seamless integration of Auth0 and PostgreSQL

🏗 Current Architecture

Frontend (Next.js + React) → API Layer → Prisma ORM → PostgreSQL Database ↓ WebSocket Server (Real-time updates)

💡 Inspiration

Pebble was inspired by our experience as members of SEDS FIU, where coordinating tasks, deadlines, and accountability was often a challenge. Without a centralized system, responsibilities were unclear and deadlines could easily slip. Out of this frustration came the idea for Pebble: a simple yet powerful open-source platform that helps teams stay aligned, reduce confusion, and improve workflow.

🔨 How We Built It

Pebble was developed using a modern full-stack approach:

Started with the Next.js dashboard tutorial as a foundation
Expanded with authentication, database connections, and dynamic UI components (charts, cards, skeleton loaders)
Built session persistence with Auth0
Designed a PostgreSQL database schema for users, tasks, and invoices
Iteratively improved the responsive UI with Tailwind CSS

🧩 Challenges

Learning curve: Adapting to Auth0, Next.js middleware, and handling early errors like “Invalid URL” or JSX parsing issues
Integration hurdles: Debugging conflicts between authentication, dashboard rendering, and PostgreSQL
UI/UX refinement: Iterative improvements to sidebar navigation, invoice alignment, and dashboard card layouts
Time pressure: Balancing coding with on-the-fly research during the hackathon

🏆 Accomplishments

Implemented Auth0 authentication with session persistence
Built a professional dashboard with charts, cards, and live task/invoice data
Learned proper handling of environment variables and middleware
Strengthened collaboration using GitHub workflows
Delivered a tool our own club (SEDS FIU) can use immediately for accountability

📚 What We Learned

Effective use of Next.js App Router for modular pages
Practical Auth0 integration in production
Designing a database schema for task/team management
Debugging and refining responsive UI with Tailwind CSS
The importance of small details—consistent font sizes, alignment, and loading states
Better team collaboration under hackathon constraints

📊 Cost Comparison

Solution	Monthly Cost (10 users)	Annual Cost
Asana Premium	$119.90	$1,438.80
Monday.com	$80.00	$960.00
Notion Team	$100.00	$1,200.00
Pebble	$0.00	$0.00

Self-hosting costs may apply depending on infrastructure choices

📱 Usage

Join a session - Enter your name to start collaborating
Add tasks - Type in the input field and hit Enter or click Add
Complete tasks - Check the checkbox to mark tasks as done
Delete tasks - Click the × button to remove tasks
See live updates - Watch as teammates add and complete tasks in real-time

🎯 Roadmap

Phase 1 (Hackathon MVP)

[x] Basic task CRUD operations
[x] Real-time collaboration
[x] Simple user system
[x] Prisma database integration
[x] WebSocket real-time updates

Phase 2 (Post-Hackathon)

[x] User authentication with email/password
[x] Project/workspace separation
[x] Task assignments and due dates

Phase 3 (Community Driven)

[ ] Google Drive integration
[ ] Email notifications
[ ] Offline support
[ ] Custom themes and branding
[ ] Plugin system
[ ] Advanced reporting

🤝 Contributing

We welcome contributions from student developers and organizations! This project is built by the community, for the community.

How to Contribute

Fork the repository
Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature/amazing-feature)
Make your changes
Test your changes
Commit your changes (git commit -m 'Add some amazing feature')
Push to the branch (git push origin feature/amazing-feature)
Open a Pull Request

🏫 Student Organizations Using Pebble

FIU SEDS (Students for the Exploration and Development of Space) - Founding organization
Add your organization here by opening a PR!

📄 License

MIT License - Feel free to use, modify, and distribute. See LICENSE for details.

🙏 Acknowledgments

FIU SEDS - For the inspiration and initial use case
The Student Developer Community - For believing that great tools shouldn't break the bank
Open Source Contributors - This project exists because of your contributions